Methods, systems, and apparatuses for improving drop velocity uniformity, drop mass uniformity, and drop formation

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10189252-B2
Application number	US-201715610445-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	May 31, 2017
Priority date	Jan 10, 2014
Publication date	Jan 29, 2019
Grant date	Jan 29, 2019

Abstract

Methods and systems are described herein for driving droplet ejection devices with multi-level waveforms. In one embodiment, a method for driving droplet ejection devices includes applying a multi-level waveform to the droplet ejection devices. The multi-level waveform includes a first section having at least one compensating edge and a second section having at least one drive pulse. The compensating edge has a compensating effect on systematic variation in droplet velocity or droplet mass across the droplet ejection devices. In another embodiment, the compensating edge has a compensating effect on cross-talk between the droplet ejection devices.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method, comprising:
determining image data for a plurality of droplet ejection devices;
converting the image data into converted data to be stored in an image buffer having first and second levels;
processing the converted data to determine cross-talk affected data for cross-talk between the plurality of droplet ejection devices; and
applying a multi-level waveform including a first level and a second level to the plurality of droplet ejection devices, wherein the second level of the multi-level waveform includes a first section having at least one compensating edge and a second section having at least one drive pulse, the at least one compensating edge has a compensating effect to compensate for cross-talk variation across the plurality of droplet ejection devices that is mapped to a third level of the image buffer, and wherein the first level of the multi-level waveform comprises the second section without the first section that is mapped to one of the first and second levels of the image buffer.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein processing the converted data to determine cross-talk affected data includes identifying pixels that are affected by cross-talk.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the converted data that forms a low density image has low cross-talk and the converted data that forms a high density image has high cross-talk.

4. The method of claim 2 , further comprising:
shifting the identified pixels that are affected by cross-talk from the first or second level into the third level of the image buffer.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one compensating edge increases or decreases a drop velocity of the droplets ejected by the droplet ejection devices.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one compensating edge causes an increase or decrease in drop mass of droplets ejected by the droplet ejection devices.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one compensating edge is to improve drop formation of droplets ejected by the droplet ejection devices.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one compensating edge is to reduce frequency response variation of droplets ejected by the droplet ejection devices.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one compensating edge is designed to not eject a droplet.

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one compensating edge in the first section has a peak voltage that is approximately ten percent of a peak voltage of the at least one drive pulse in the second section of the multi-level waveform.

11. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one drive pulse of the multi-level waveform comprises two drive pulses for ejecting one or more droplets of a fluid.

12. The method of claim 11 , wherein a first drive pulse has a different peak voltage level than a peak voltage level of a second drive pulse of the two drive pulses.

13. The method of claim 1 , wherein the multi-level waveform further comprises a non-drop-firing portion that includes a jet straightening edge having a droplet straightening function and at least one cancellation edge having an energy canceling function.

14. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one compensating edge comprises a compensating pulse with a time period from firing of the compensating pulse and a subsequent firing of a first drive pulse of the at least one drive pulse is approximately a resonance time period.

Assignees

• Panchawagh Hrishikesh V
• Menzel Christoph
• Fujifilm Dimatix Inc

Inventors

• Panchawagh Hrishikesh V
• Menzel Christoph

Classifications

• B41J2/04561

  detecting presence or properties of a drop in flight · CPC title

• B41J2202/12

  with ink circulating through the whole print head · CPC title

• B41J2/04598 Primary

  Pre-pulse · CPC title

• B41J2/0456

  detecting drop size, volume or weight · CPC title

• B41J2/04588 Primary

  using a specific waveform · CPC title